# Qualitative Analysis of a Graph Transformer Approach to Addressing Hate Speech: Adapting to Dynamically Changing Content

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2301.10871 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.10871/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 12 of its 23 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 25 Jan 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 12 of 12)

- [BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers for Language Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.04805/) (2018)
- [Graph Attention Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1710.10903/) (2017)
- [A Comprehensive Survey on Graph Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1901.00596/) (2019)
- [Automated Hate Speech Detection and the Problem of Offensive Language](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.04009/) (2017)
- [The Hateful Memes Challenge: Detecting Hate Speech in Multimodal Memes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.04790/) (2020)
- [HateXplain: A Benchmark Dataset for Explainable Hate Speech Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.10289/) (2020)
- [Do Transformers Really Perform Bad for Graph Representation?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.05234/) (2021)
- [Large Scale Crowdsourcing and Characterization of Twitter Abusive Behavior](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.00393/) (2018)
- [Quantifying social organization and political polarization in online platforms](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.00590/) (2020)
- [Data Bootstrapping Approaches to Improve Low Resource Abusive Language Detection for Indic Languages](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.12543/) (2022)
- [Abusive Language Detection with Graph Convolutional Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.04073/) (2019)
- [Predicting Hateful Discussions on Reddit using Graph Transformer Networks and Communal Context](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.04248/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [Multi-Modal Discussion Transformer: Integrating Text, Images and Graph Transformers to Detect Hate Speech on Social Media](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.09312/) (2023)
- [GASTON: Graph-Aware Social Transformer for Online Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.02524/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Our work advances an approach for predicting hate speech in social media, drawing out the critical need to consider the discussions that follow a post to successfully detect when hateful discourse may arise. Using graph transformer networks, coupled with modelling attention and BERT-level natural language processing, our approach can capture context and anticipate upcoming anti-social behaviour. In this paper, we offer a detailed qualitative analysis of this solution for hate speech detection in social networks, leading to insights into where the method has the most impressive outcomes in comparison with competitors and identifying scenarios where there are challenges to achieving ideal performance. Included is an exploration of the kinds of posts that permeate social media today, including the use of hateful images. This suggests avenues for extending our model to be more comprehensive. A key insight is that the focus on reasoning about the concept of context positions us well to be able to support multi-modal analysis of online posts. We conclude with a reflection on how the problem we are addressing relates especially well to the theme of dynamic change, a critical concern for all AI solutions for social impact. We also comment briefly on how mental health well-being can be advanced with our work, through curated content attuned to the extent of hate in posts.